FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. – The 2010 season opened officially for the Arizona State University cross country program on Saturday afternoon as the Sun Devils sent five men and six women to run in the George Kyte Invitational, which was hosted by Northern Arizona at Buffalo Park in Flagstaff, Ariz. While the Sun Devils used the event as a training run, they finished as a group on the men’s side and closely as a women’s team with all men placing in the Top 25 and the women all in the Top 15.

In the team scored event, the women placed second with 42 points and the men were fourth with 75 points. Arizona won the women’s race with 29 points while the host Lumberjacks took the men’s title with 31 points.

The women’s 5,000m run was the first event on the course where the Top 5 finishers for the Sun Devils finished within 18 seconds of one another. Lindsay Prescott (18:49.1), Anna Sperry (18:49.5) and Alyssa Allison (18:50.1) all crossed the line closely as they finished sixth, seventh and eighth, respectively, overall. The final two scoring positions went to Kauren Tarver (19:06.1) and Karlee Owens (19:06.8), who placed 10th and 11th, respectively, while Kate Lydy also ran, finishing 14th (19:38.1).

While the women finished close to one another, the men blanketed the finish line nearly as one to finish their 8,000m tempo run as all five crossed the line within one second of one another. Daniel Lovell was the first to cross, taking 19th in 28:12.4. He was followed by Doug Smith (28:12.7), Darius Terry (28:12.9), Cameron Liston (28:13.1) and Ben Engelhardt (28:13.3), who placed 20th, 21st, 22nd and 23rd, respectively.

Three runners made their ASU cross country debuts in the race. For the women, Allison ran her first cross country race at ASU after transferring in from Arkansas after the 2009 cross country season before competing for the Sun Devils on the track. Owens also ran her first cross country race in an ASU uniform after redshirting her freshman season last year. For the men, Terry made his ASU debut after running the past two seasons for NAU, where he was teammates with Liston, who debuted last year for ASU.

The Sun Devils will have a weekend off from competition before they travel south to Tucson on Friday, September 17, to compete in the Dave Murray Invitational.